I didn't even have to look at the book to know that he's standing in a room where people have been subjected to torture - look at those weapons, implements of pain.

This is a guy who doesn't use the sword as a tool - I see cruelty in his face, and sense that he is most happy when he terrifies someone else with his power. He'd like me to think that he is intelligent, well-read and orderly. I see all those things, but they are "ramped up" to an extreme here - as if that's the only way he can maintain some semblance of control of himself. I can just imagine him carefully wiping the blood of his victims off the walls of the room after he's finished with his game.

I know I keep saying this on different threads but here it is marginally appropriate.

I dated a guy whose face and stature very closely resembled the Knight of Swords. He was mainly of Swiss descent FWIW.

My view of his temperament, by the time I dumped him, was that it closely resembled the temperament of the Knight of Swords depicted here.

So I have mixed feelings, to say the least, about this card (not to mention what it says about me that I was together with the Knight of Swords for three years). Get this, baba: he was a highly cultured man who also was a major collector of Nazi military memorabilia.

Every woman adores a Fascist,
The boot in the face, the brute
Brute heart of a brute like you.

<shivers>

M_M~

ETA: I just reread "Daddy" and it actually makes a reference to a "Taroc pack." Talk about synchronicity, or perhaps what my college lit teacher called an "irrelevant correlative," which is a snotty way of pooh-poohing synchronicity.

Every woman adores a Fascist,
The boot in the face, the brute
Brute heart of a brute like you.

Great quote. And don't I know it. Always had a intense overwhelming animal attraction to men like that, of course mixed in with fierce intelligence and wit. They never come on like that in the beginning do they? But we sense it on a silent unconscious, so we're drawn to them.....

Also have a lifelong fetish for me in tall black boots....uhg. Nothing but trouble.

I can agree to dating a few brutes myself, there is somthing deep and brooding that is the attraction there

. I was looking at the way he is frowning. I wonder if infact he isnt scarey at all but saying "damn, I wish i'd have bought my reactions glasses in the 2 for 1 sale at spec savers"
on the serious side of things:-)

He isnt someone you would want to be around in the longterm. yet, someone you wouldnt want to make an enemy of. his sole aim is himself and he lacks compassion or pity. I think has broken a few hearts and wouldnt give a thought about them. He'd simply move on and forget who stood there nursing him better making sure he was ok.
He sees compassion as a weakness, it is a life where he leaves a trail of destruction. brutally honest in his words, needs are unimportant, being attatched to a single person or thing is a weakness. The sword behind him is as cold as he is.
Sometimes hides in the shadows and bides his time, callously plotting and thinking of his next move as if life is but a game of chess. I imagine him playing cat and mouse with peoples emotions.
I see him calling for a war when one isnt needed. He will do things because he simply can, not because it is right to do so. friends aren't through love but, through fear alone.

does that sum him up?
perhaps its better as a reversal for the card and not upright.

I've been to the movies last Saturday and the very first card that came to my mind when watching Johnny Depp in "Sweeney Todd - The Demon Barber from Fleet Street" was this Knight.

At the very beginning I had thought of this Knight of being reputable and good, althought a tad too serious. Maybe belonging to the Templer or the Freemason or the Knights at the round table (he has the age to fit it, mind you).

But this movie changed everything because the role of Sweeney Todd is so very much the Knight of Swords! Nothing can stop his vengeance, even not his beloved wife and daughter who he doesn't recognize. He's too much in bloodlust.

ETA: I just reread "Daddy" and it actually makes a reference to a "Taroc pack." Talk about synchronicity, or perhaps what my college lit teacher called an "irrelevant correlative," which is a snotty way of pooh-poohing synchronicity.

You know, I would call it synchronicity NOT an "irrelevant" anything.

I suppose this card came out of many conversations Alex and I have had about man's inhumanity to man. We're both from troubled cultures and one thing that's always disturbed me is how intelligent, educated and seemingly "refined" people can do this kind of thing. That's the point about this knight, he is learned and well-read and smart. But.

But this movie changed everything because the role of Sweeney Todd is so very much the Knight of Swords! Nothing can stop his vengeance, even not his beloved wife and daughter who he doesn't recognize. He's too much in bloodlust.

Well, yes, but I don't think he's this Knight of Swords, actually. Because he IS motivated by love and revenge, by passion. This Knight/Swords is motivated by sadism. That's very different. Sweeney would NOT be a blood thirsty killer if he was living happily with his wife. This Knight/Swords IS torturing and killing people...and he's probably also going to a nice, cozy home with wife and kids afterwards.

That's a big, important difference. This Knight/Swords needs NO motivation to do what he does. Sweeney needed a big motivation to become and do what he does.

I'd say what you have with Sweeny is the 6/Wands of this deck. Victory at any price. Revenge at any price. A burning anger motivates him, not cold, sadistic pleasure.

The Aeclectic Tarot Forum closed permanently on July 14th, 2017. The public threads remain online as a read-only archive and resource. More information on our decision can be found here. Thank you for being a part of our active community over the past seventeen years.